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CITY COUNCIL VIRTUAL MEETING Regular Meeting July 28, 2020 The one-hundred and one meeting of the City Council of Charleston was held this date convening at 5:00 p.m. over video conference call (Zoom). A notice of this meeting and an agenda were made available on the City’s website July 23, 2020 and appeared in the Post and Courier on July 27, 2020. PRESENT (13) The Honorable John J. Tecklenburg, Mayor Councilmember Delcioppo District 1 Councilmember Waring District 7 Councilmember Shealy District 2 Councilmember Seekings District 8 Councilmember Sakran District 3 Councilmember Shahid District 9 Councilmember Mitchell District 4 Councilmember Griffin District 10 Councilmember Brady District 5 Councilmember Appel District 11 Councilmember Gregorie District 6 Councilmember Jackson District 12 Mayor Tecklenburg called the meeting to order at 5:00 p.m. The Clerk called the roll. Mayor Tecklenburg said, “Thank you, Madam Clerk. Now, if you all would like to join us, Councilmember Sakran will lead us in an invocation.” Councilmember Sakran opened the meeting with an invocation. Councilmember Sakran then led City Council in the Pledge of Allegiance. Mayor Tecklenburg said, “Thank you. Speaking of justice, we have two soon to be judges joining us. We approved their selection at the last meeting. They weren’t on the Zoom call. I think Lindsey had an audio connection, but we’d like to just call on the two of them to introduce themselves to you. Lindsey Byrd, ladies first.” Ms. Byrd said, “Hi, thank you, Mayor. Hi, I’m Lindsey Byrd. I’ve been the City’s Deputy Prosecutor for the last five and a half, almost six years, and I’m really looking forward to continuing to serve the City in this new role for myself. So, thank you all very much for your vote. I look forward to working with you.” Mayor Tecklenburg said, “Thank you, Lindsey. Also, with us is Emmanuel Ferguson. Emmanuel.” City of Charleston July 28, 2020 Page 2 Mr. Ferguson said, “Hello. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I just want to express my appreciation to the City for giving me this opportunity to serve. I have been a Solicitor. Actually, I worked with Lindsey at the Solicitor’s Office, and then I moved on to assisting the United States Attorney before turning to civil defense. I, frankly, am quite excited to be able to serve the City in this capacity, and I look forward to working with the Municipal Court staff, many of whom I’ve met. Again, I am very appreciative of this opportunity.” Mayor Tecklenburg said, “Great. Thank you so much. Does anyone on Council have any questions of either Lindsey or Emmanuel?” Mayor Tecklenburg recognized Councilmember Shahid. Councilmember Shahid said, “I just want to welcome you both onboard. Get your running shoes on, both judges. We have a backload of cases, and I think you could be hitting the ground running with the idea of giving out fair justice to our citizens, but also move these cases along. Thank you all for being a part of the process of those interviews that we had. We look forward to working with all of you all. God bless you, and good luck.” Ms. Byrd said, “Thank you.” Mr. Ferguson said, “Thank you.” Mayor Tecklenburg recognized Councilmember Waring. Councilmember Waring said, “Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I just want to welcome both aboard. I really do appreciate the diversification, frankly, coming onboard the court system. This is a generational thing right now. When you look at some of the men and women who have served on this court, they’ve been there for a long time. So, this for us is a shift, and I certainly look forward to you all putting your best intellect to work on behalf of the City of Charleston, and certainly, our citizens at large. Welcome.” Ms. Byrd said, “Thank you.” Mr. Ferguson said, “Thank you, sir.” Mayor Tecklenburg said, “Alright. If there is no one else, we will move on. Thank you all again for being with us and best of luck to you. Glad to have you on the team.” The Clerk said, “Mayor?” Mayor Tecklenburg said, “Yes, ma’am.” The Clerk said, “For the record, Councilwoman Jackson is with us.” Mayor Tecklenburg said, “Oh, great.” Councilwoman Jackson said, “Sorry, I had a computer glitch.” Mayor Tecklenburg said, “No problem. Welcome aboard. Without further ado, we are going to move right into our Public Hearings. We have a number of them, I think fifteen on the City of Charleston July 28, 2020 Page 3 agenda this evening. Normally, Christopher Morgan helps introduce these. Are you around, Christopher?” Mr. Morgan said, “Yes, Mr. Mayor. I am here. I’ll start on these. I am going to go to the screen share, and we are going to go through the maps and slides that we normally have for these. Are you all seeing the screen share?” Councilmember Waring said, “Not yet.” Mr. Morgan said, “Let’s see. I wonder why it’s not doing that. Let me try this again. There we go. Are you all seeing the screen share now?” Mayor Tecklenburg said, “Yes, sir.” Councilmember Waring said, “I think so.” Councilwoman Jackson said, “Yes.” Mr. Morgan said, “Okay. We are going to go through here if I can advance it. Alright. E-1, public hearing this is 295 Calhoun Street, Harleston Village. It is a rezoning from Height District 85/30 to Height District by stories, District 7 for seven story height. The applicant and owner have changed during this rezoning process. The applicants had changed because the Medical University of South Carolina sold it to the actual applicant, which is the development firm that we’ll be hearing from this evening. I will give an overview of this now. Can you all see the cursor moving around on the image?” Councilmembers Waring and Jackson said, “Yes.” Mr. Morgan said, “This is Calhoun Street running east and west directly across the street from Roper Hospital. You can see how the Medical District still has the height in feet because that ends up working better for the medical buildings. The other areas of the Peninsula have the Old City Height District which are now by stories. So, the request for this site is to go from 85/30 district, what it is at present, to the 7-story district. It is in our Urban Core, so that is where the most dense type of buildings will go. So, that is appropriate. This is an aerial image of the site. You all know it probably well as an old, MUSC owned, medical office building with one story. Here is an image looking to the southwest of the site. Here is an image from Alberta Long Lake north. You see Roper Hospital across the street, which is a 7-story structure. Here is a ground view, where you see the new Shawn Jenkins MUSC Hospital that has just been completed. Here is a street view from Halsey Boulevard looking to the north. That is Roper Hospital in the distance, and the subject site is on the left. Here we see the subject site, and further down to the right, you see the new Roper parking lot that is under construction there at the immediate right. Then, there are some slides that the applicant has also given us, which show the overall heights in the surrounding area. Of course, the new MUSC Children’s Hospital height is 206 feet. The Ashley House, which is on the same side of the street as this subject property, is 158 feet to the top of the Penthouse, and the MUSC Biomedical facility, down Courtenay Drive, is 190 feet. Of course, across the street is Roper Hospital, which is 7 feet. It is a conceptual concept. It is a concept image of a building on the site that will be up to seven stories or eight with architectural merit. So, this is the request that is before Council. I will go back to our cover sheet for further City of Charleston July 28, 2020 Page 4 discussion. The Planning Commission, at their June meeting, recommended approval of this Height District change unanimously.” Mayor Tecklenburg said, “So, Jennifer or Vanessa, did we have anyone sign up to make remarks on this item?” The Clerk said, “It looks like we have two people, Cashion Drolet and Jason Long, who wish to speak.” Mayor Tecklenburg said, “Okay, terrific. I see Jason Long. Do you want to go first, if we can unmute you? There you go, Jason.” Mr. Long said, “Yes, sir, Mr. Mayor, and members of Council.” The Clerk said, “Excuse me. How much time, Mayor?” Mayor Tecklenburg said, “A couple of minutes, two minutes.” The Clerk said, “Okay.” 1. Mr. Long said, “Yes, sir. I will keep it brief. Thank you again for hearing us on this matter. It’s good to see you, via Zoom. Thank you just for your consideration on this. We think that the height in stories, again, we’re not changing the density in this request, it is a height in stories, versus the height in feet, which creates a nicer project in our opinion. It gives us better ceiling height and just flexibility to have a nicer, overall project. A better project to go on the tax rolls, quite frankly. So, thank you for this hearing. I don’t want to belabor the point, but we’re available for any questions that come up.” Mayor Tecklenburg said, “Thank you, Jason. Cashion, are you out there?” 2. Ms. Drolet said, “Yes, Mr.

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